Up to now, a disc player has been in use, in which an optical disc having information signals, such as audio signals, recorded thereon, is used as a recording medium. This type of the disc player in widespread use houses only a sole optical disc in the main body portion of the apparatus and is designed to reproduce only this optical disc. This disc player has a disc tray moved in the horizontal direction across the inside and the outside of the main body portion of the device for loading the optical disc. This disc tray is moved by a movement mechanism between a position of insertion/ejection of the optical disc pulled to outside of the main body portion of the device and a reproducing position inside the main body portion of the device. When the disc tray is moved to the reproducing position, a disc reproducing unit is moved to approach the disc tray. By the disc reproducing unit approaching the disc tray, an optical disc held on the disc tray is loaded on a disc rotating actuating mechanism for reproducing information signals, such as audio signals recorded on the optical disc.
With such disc player, attempts are being made for reducing the size of the device for improving the spatial efficiency of the mounting space. Ideally, the diameter of the main body portion of the disc player is equal to that of the optical disc accommodated therein. With the disc player, a disc tray for moving the optical disc into and outwardly from the main body portion of the disc player, a movement mechanism for moving the disc tray into and outwardly from the main body portion of the disc player, and a disc driving mechanism for rotationally driving the optical disc need to be provided within the main body portion. Thus it is difficult to reduce the size of the disc player to a size approximately equal to the diameter of the optical disc.
On the other hand, for enabling continuous reproduction of an optical disc, such a disc player is used having plural optical discs housed within its main body portion and having the disc exchanging function of selectively reproducing these optical discs. In this type of the disc player, a number of disc trays, adapted for being moved horizontally into and out of the main body portion of the device are stacked in plural tiers in the vertical direction perpendicular to the movement direction. This type of the disc player needs to be provided with a movement mechanism for horizontally moving the disc trays across the inside and the outside of the main body portion of the device and a selection mechanism for selecting the disc trays. This renders it still more difficult to reduce the size of the disc player than in the case of the disc player adapted for housing, holding and reproducing the sole optical disc.
In the disc player housing plural optical discs, it is necessary to be able to move the disc reproducing unit in the up-and-down direction relative to the arraying direction of the plural disc trays for enabling the optical discs held on the selected disc tray to be run in rotation. To this end, it is necessary to be able to detect the position of the disc reproducing device along its height. Moreover, since the disc tray is moved between the outwardly extracted position enabling disc exchange and the reproducing position in the main body portion of the player, as described above, it is also necessary to detect the disc tray position. If the positions of the disc reproducing unit and the disc tray are detected in this manner, the operability of the entire device tends to be worsened.
The disc recording and/or reproducing apparatus, inclusive of the disc player, tends to be subjected to vibrations under the shock applied from outside during use or transport. The disc driving unit of the disc recording and/or reproducing apparatus is heavier in weight due to the provision of the driving motor for driving the disc or of the optical pickup device as the recording and/or reproducing unit. If a shock is applied to the main body portion of the apparatus, the transporting mechanism for transporting the disc driving unit to the reproducing position tends to be damaged.
In particular, in the disc recording and/or reproducing apparatus having plural disc trays in tiers, the disc driving unit needs to be raised or lowered by a transport mechanism to the position of the disc tray holding the optical disc selected by the user. This transport mechanism needs to have the function of transporting the disc driving unit a height corresponding to the stacked height of the disc trays. This correspondingly complicates the structure of the transport mechanism. If a shock is applied to the disc recording and/or reproducing apparatus, the apparatus tends to be damaged. If, with the optical disc loaded on the disc driving unit, the disc recording and/or reproducing apparatus is in disorder, it becomes occasionally impossible to unload the optical disc from the main body portion of the apparatus.
The disc tray for moving the optical disc provided in the disc recording and/or reproducing apparatus into and out of the main body portion of the apparatus has a disc setting portion on its surface for setting the loaded optical disc thereon. Since the disc tray is formed on its both lateral sides parallel to its movement direction with ribs engaged in guide grooves formed in the sidewall sections of the main body portion of the apparatus, the disc tray width becomes larger than the disc diameter to render it difficult to reduce the width and size of the entire apparatus.
Thus, for reducing the size of the apparatus, such an apparatus is proposed in which the disc tray width is set so as to be slightly smaller than the optical disc diameter. With this disc tray, it is proposed to provide cut-outs on its both lateral sides parallel to the direction of movement and to have the outer rim exposed to outside via this cut-out.
With this disc tray, since the optical disc is partially exposed to outside via this cut-out, it becomes impossible to positively protect the optical disc held thereon. If the disc recording and/or reproducing apparatus, having the disc tray, is tilted with the optical disc housed in its main body portion, the optical disc tends to be deviated on the disc setting portion of the disc tray. If the optical disc is deviated in the main body portion of the device, the disc tray is likely to be unable to be pulled out along with the disc. The optical disc, deviated from the disc tray, tends to be caught by the disc tray driving unit to obstruct the operation of the driving unit. For possibly evading this problem, the optical disc needs to be held on the disc tray such as to evade positional deviation in both the up-and-down direction and the horizontal direction.
The disc recording and/or reproducing apparatus, having plural disc trays moved in the horizontal direction across the inside and the outside of the main body portion of the apparatus, has plural openings on the front side of the main body portion of the apparatus via which to extract the disc trays to outside of the main body portion of the apparatus. The disc recording and/or reproducing apparatus is provided with a lid adapted for closing the openings when the disc tray is moved into the main body portion of the apparatus. This lid prevents foreign matter from being intruded into the main body portion of the apparatus via the opening kept open to protect the units provided in the main body portion of the apparatus.
The above openings are independently provided in the front side of the main body portion of the apparatus and are respectively associated with lids adapted for opening/closing the openings. If the openings and the lids adapted for opening/closing the openings are provided separately, it becomes difficult to provide the opening of a sufficient height to permit all of the disc trays to be protruded outwardly of the main body portion of the apparatus. In particular, the disc tray for moving the optical disc across the inside and the outside of the main body portion of the apparatus needs to be provided on its upper surface with a recessed disc setting portion in which to hold the optical disc of a constant thickness. Moreover, the disc tray is provided on its lateral surface with a rack gear adapted for meshing with a driving gear of the movement mechanism adapted for moving the disc tray. Thus it is impossible to reduce the disc tray thickness to less than a pre-set thickness. Thus, the disc tray thickness cannot be reduced to less than a certain value. For smoothly pulling out the disc tray outwardly of the main body portion of the apparatus, the opening needs to be of a pre-set height, so that, if the openings are provided separately, the disc player cannot be reduced in height.
Also, if the opening height is decreased, the lid height is reduced, so that, if the lid surface is used as a display surface, the display area is diminished to render it impossible to provide a sufficiently large display.